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Horace Elisha Scudder

The Boy That Stole Apples

An Old Man found a rude Boy upon one of his trees, stealing apples, and told him to come down; but the young rogue told him plainly he would not. "Won’t you!" said the Old Man, "then I will fetch you down;" so he pulled up some tufts of grass and threw at him; but this only made the youngster laugh, to think the Old Man should think to beat him down from the tree with grass only. "Well, well," said the Old Man, "if neither words nor grass will do, I will try what virtue there is in stones;" with that he pelted him heartily with stones, which soon made the Boy clamber down from the tree and beg the Old Man’s pardon.